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Monday, May 21, 2007

I've Been Tagged: For Real!

I was doing 47 MPH in the village 30 MPH zone. The trooper was so young and adorable. I told him I had no excuse when he asked me why I would do such a dangerous thing as speed through a school zone in the morning.

He asked for my license, registration and insurance card. I pulled out a registration and he said no, it was no longer valid. I asked if I could throw it out and he said yes. Then I gave him another, then another, and finally remembered the one I had put behind the passenger sun visor. It has the registration tags on it that I was supposed to put on my license plates last summer. I found an insurance card that I had had faxed to me last autumn for the last school field trip so that I could carry students, but that was now expired also. I have never bothered to have another one faxed to me. I pulled my license out of my wallet and then I became concerned. I have used black permanent marker to blacken out parts of the information on my driver's license that I feel are too personal to be on a driver's license.

Despite the speeding, no proof of insurance, no registration tags on my license plates, and my disfigured license, the trooper gave me a only a warning.

How can you give a woman that is the age of your mom a speeding ticket?

My record is still secure: I have never gotten a speeding ticket yet. My young and beautiful daughters can't even make that claim. A ticket today would have been 3 points on my insurance.

But there were three state troopers and two sheriffs in the town of Barton today: 1 each in each village of Orleans and Barton and 1 cruising around the town. I wonder what caused all this? It took me forever to get to my meeting in Newport this morning. When I returned to Barton at 2 PM it was a surreal drive through town as everyone was driving as if there were troopers behind every tree.

Literary: You may have a point there. The only time the state police or sheriff show up in town are during the summer holidays. But on the other hand, it is a week away! I'll be nosing around asking and figure it out!

Mama, why do you have permanant marker on your license?? I can't believe you were speeding and in a school zone! Shame, shame. You have to be careful. Lucky for you the trooper was young. Imagine if he were older...